New victims of the largest and most notorious mining disasters in Belgian history have been identified 70 years later.
Two people have been identified from the 14 sets of remains that previously could not be formally confirmed following the 1956 mine disaster in Bois du Cazier in Marcinelle.
The director of Bois du Cazier in Marcinelle, Charleroi, confirmed the news on Thursday morning.
The investigation began in 2019 at the request of the son of one of the 262 victims of the disaster.
He was hoping that his father could be formally identified among the fourteen nameless victims whose bodies lay in the field of honour at the Marcinelle cemetery.
Illustration shows miners from Bois du Cazier, a colliery situated at Marcinelle, on 13 August 1956, just after the Bois du Cazier disaster. Credit: Belga Archives
Researchers had exhumed the bodies and located close relatives of the victims to perform DNA comparisons using modern technologies. As a result, the first victim was recognised in 2022. A second and a third followed in 2024, and a fourth in 2025.
The coal mine disaster killed 262 miners, mostly Italians, at the Bois du Cazier coal mine at Marcinelle, Hainaut Province, in Belgium on 8 August 1956.
The Bois du Cazier site is now a museum and has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 2012.
